Floatinghead's ramblings about music and music-related themes interspersed with various interludes and home of Cabeza de Vaca radio show on Scanner FM, Barcelona.

Monday, October 7, 2013

P053: Cabeza de Vaca – Violetshaped

“Because we are
so free, everything must be prohibited”

- Cody Wilson

A return to
noisy techno this week on Cabeza de Vaca and Scanner FM as we turn our focus to the troika of monikers
Violetshaped, Violet Poison and Shapednoise. As you might guess, the last two
go together to make the first. Not many other biographical details to share as
in keeping with techno tradition, everything is shrouded in mystery.

Perhaps the most educational piece you will
find is an article over at Electronic Beats.
Whereas there was an excellent mix over at Electronic Explorations earlier this
year.

The debut album by the duo as Violetshaped
has been getting consistently good reviews from the media which it thoroughly
deserved. Just as intriguing though are the more recent run of remix single,
none of which are on the show sadly, but which fills in the gaps between
experimental electronica, purer noise and of course techno. Keith Fullerton Whitman’s
remix is a great example of how at last all these genres seem to meet in some
murky, clanking nexus. Their mix above also shows this important side of their
influences as well.

Both artists have also had a lot of
releases under their individual name this year as well.

Sometimes it pays to read the package more
carefully. This week we feature a track Druss that when I first came across it
I though was the group GNOD, but they are actually only “presenting” the
release, whatever that means. In any case the groups crunchy kraut-techno sound
fits in nicely with the industrial techno sound that has found a new home for a
similar angry, feedback drenched soundscape full of rasping metal and dissatisfaction.

In preparing the show there was at one
stage as many Orphx tracks as Violetshaped, but as the later where perhaps
slightly more prolific at the right moment, they got the show, but I think it
will be mandatory to do something on Orphx at some stage. A huge recording
career and a lot of direct and convinving tracks. “Vanishing Point” which opens
this weeks show couldn’t be more perfect, made for a big system and yet almost
catchy enough to be a radio hit (sic). There is plenty more from them out there
too. It is worth spending a bit of time with this live recording made for a
Forms of Hands label special earlier this year. The sound quality is excellent,
although I am sure the label can afford a tripod or a sober filmer next time.

But most startling was the inclusion of
some of Orphx music in this documentary about 3D printing technology and a
young American called Cody Wilson who wants to make a freely downloadable file
for gun parts to overcome Obama’s recent ban on weapons after the Newport massacre.
Wilson is a strikingly conflicting character, parading such a nationalism that
is somehow at odds with a frighteningly sharp and critical intelligence.

“There is no evidence of a political program
anymore in the world. In America there aren’t genuine politics, there’s the
media telling you Barack Obama versus Mitt Romney. It’s like the epic clash of
ideology, when we both know they are globalist neo-liberals. They both exist to
preserve the interest of this relatively autonomous class of Goldman Sachs
bankers”

- Cody Wilson

The inability to support or criticise him
makes him seem like a character from a Werner Herzog film. Essential viewing.